despite their pain and vulnerability. The child she’d once been always came to her freighted with guilt and loneliness, but when it was time to abandon her again she clung to the adult Julia with a strength born of fear, terrified to be cast into the shadows and forgotten until the next time.
And even though Julia knew that the frightened little personality was no ghost at all, but merely a long-ago echo of her own self, she felt as if she was turning her back on a real child—a child who had haunted her all her life for some purpose that she’d never been able to understand.
A convulsion ran through her body, and she felt the desperate presence receding into the furthermost corner of her mind with all the other memories that she never allowed herself to examine. She felt as if she’d just run ten miles, and her limbs were shaking with exertion.
“She’s nowhere around the house and I checked the woods as far back as the fence line.” Cord melted out of the grayness, King—the present King, not the long-gone one from her childhood, Julia thought with a moment of shaky confusion—at his heels. There was just enough light now to make out the tortured expression on his features and the straight, grim line of his mouth, and she put her hand lightly on his arm. Her fingers were still trembling, and her voice was unsteady.
“She’s in the old boathouse.”
The hope that flared in his eyes was instantly tempered with apprehension, and she forestalled his reply. “I know. She couldn’t have picked a more dangerous place—I’ve been meaning to have it pulled down since I came back here. You’re going to have to let me go in alone, Cord. I’m lighter than you are and those rotten floorboards might take my weight long enough for me to get her out of there.”
“No. I’ll go.” His tone brooked no argument, and her hand tightened on his arm.
“She was running from me, Cord! If you bring her back she’ll only try again. Don’t you see—she has to know that I came for her. She has to know that I want her enough so that I’ll never stop looking for her until I find her, and that just won’t happen if you deliver her to me like a package. She already trusts you—now I have to prove to her that she can trust me.” She hesitated, and then added in an undertone, “Besides, I’m her guardian. She’s my responsibility, too.”
She was using his own words against him, but she felt no compunction. She couldn’t wipe out the mistake that had ended her career—the mistake that no one knew about but herself and a dead man—but she could try to bridge the chasm she’d so unthinkingly created between herself and the child she’d vowed to protect.
She owed it to the best friends she’d ever had. Sheila and Paul had put their trust in her, and she’d let them down. She wanted the chance to make things right again, and her desperation must have shown in her eyes.
“I should know better than to try to talk you out of something you really want.” Cord glanced at the dark shape of the old boathouse with resignation. “It didn’t work when you were Lizbet’s age, it didn’t work when you were sixteen and wanted to ride my motorcycle, and it’s not going to work now, is it? But be careful. I’ll be standing right outside, so if you think the damned thing’s going to go, call out to me.”
He turned to the path that led to the boathouse and then paused. Swiftly he pulled her to him and kissed her hard on the mouth. Just as swiftly he released her, his expression unreadable. “Twenty-three months, four days and two hours,” he said tersely. “You were my addiction.”
He held her shocked gaze for the space of a heartbeat and then gave her an ironic half smile. “Walking out of your life was the one thing I never should have let you talk me into. I’m not going to let you do it a second time.”
He lightly traced the corner of her mouth, still soft from his kiss. Then he turned and set off quickly down the path. After a startled moment she ran after him, her thoughts a chaotic whirl.
He hadn’t changed at all, she thought in frustrated confusion as they hastened to the water’s edge and the rickety building that ran alongside the dock. He’d always had more confidence in her than she’d had in herself, always seen her as strong and capable and supremely in control of any situation. Tonight had been the first time a crack had appeared in his golden-girl image of her, but already he seemed to have forgotten the messy vulnerability she’d displayed in front of him.
After she’d sent him away it had taken long enough for her to reach some kind of equilibrium in her emotional existence, as sterile and empty as that existence had been. How was she supposed to cope if he came back into her life again?
The door of the boathouse was slightly ajar, and Cord carefully pulled it open wide, wincing as it creaked on its rusted hinges. Shutting her mind to what had just happened between them with an effort, Julia narrowed her gaze and looked past him into the darkness, but it was almost impossible to see anything inside. She knew that the floor ran around the perimeter of the building and in the middle was the long-disused boat slip—in actual fact, a large square opening in the floor to the lake below. She could just make out the oily ripple of water where the floor abruptly ended, but there hadn’t been boats kept there for years.
Lizbet was in there somewhere, behind the clutter of boxes and old tarpaulins and rusty motor parts. Despite any other doubts she might have, Julia knew she hadn’t been wrong about that. The child was here and she was still in danger. As if to underline her apprehension, the wind from the lake outside freshened as it always did just before dawn, and the timbers creaked ominously. The structure was in worse repair than she’d realized, she thought in alarm.
As Cord held the whining King back and followed her with a worried gaze, Julia stepped nervously into the darkness and started edging her way toward the back of the boathouse.
With her first step she felt the sponginess of rot underfoot, the unexpected give where there should have been solidity. Through the flimsy soles of her scuffs she felt the pebble-like pressure of a nailhead that had risen higher than the floorboard it originally had been meant to secure. She gingerly put her full weight onto her leg and held her breath. The floor sagged, but didn’t break.
There was a rustling sound by the far wall, on the other side of the dully gleaming rectangle in the middle of the boathouse, and then a muffled splash as something slipped into the water. Julia tried to control her shudder, but she couldn’t prevent the unpleasant prickling sensation that lifted the skin at the back of her neck. Water rats. It was bad enough knowing that they were scurrying around her in the dark, but feeling something bump against her underwater would send her right over the edge of panic. She only hoped that Lizbet didn’t know what those scuffling noises meant.
She was halfway to the pile of boxes now, and she paused. Keeping her voice low, she spoke into the darkness, praying that her presence wouldn’t frighten the little girl into any sudden movement.
“It’s me, Lizbet—your Aunt Julia. Uncle Cord’s waiting outside for us.”
She slid her foot carefully a few inches forward and felt the sickening emptiness of a missing section of floor. Sweat beaded like ice water on her forehead as she realized that Lizbet must have come this way herself only a short time before. That the child had made it safely to her dangerous refuge had been nothing short of a miracle, Julia thought shakily. She felt for a more secure footing and edged closer.
“I don’t blame you for running away, and no one’s going to make you come back if you’re not ready to. But I’ve got something important to tell you. I want you to know I’m really, really sorry for making you feel sad back at the house.”
She’d reached the pile of crates. Listening intently, she thought she could hear the soft sound of an indrawn breath behind one of them. The floor where she was standing felt more solid than the surrounding area, and she cautiously lowered herself to her knees. It was frightening enough here in the unfamiliar dark. The child whose trust she was trying to win didn’t need a disembodied voice floating down at her from on high.
“Do you know what a good luck charm is, Lizbet? It’s like a rabbit’s foot or maybe a shiny penny that you keep in your pocket for luck.” She saw